Another late start, but a few hours earlier than the previous day. Walked to a bike rental place, rented a green fixed gear Jopo bike for me (first time riding a fixed gear since I was a kid, so getting used to the foot brake required much concentration). Supposedly these things are very popular in Finland, and I can see why. While it took me a while to get a hang of it, they are relatively lightweight, sturdy (I crashed mine into a boulder with no injury to either self or bike), and fast enough for any kind of city transportation.
We walked next door to A´s friend Anna´s jewelry shop to pick up a replacement for a lost earring and recounted the many activities of the previous week. Realized how incredibly busy we had been.
Rode bikes to Tori, a Finnish restaurant, for Finnish meatballs for lunch (actually significantly different from Swedish meatballs despite my jokes to the contrary!), with lingonberry sauce and mashed potatoes.
Rode bikes through Kallio, the "working class" neighborhood I had wanted to see from the first days. While not quite as pretty as the Toölo neighborhood of Helsinki, it probably didn´t look any slummier than most parts of any other city I´ve been. Saw some sketchy characters hanging out about the supermarket where we stopped for sparkling water. Drove past a soccer game played by Somalis, arabic sounding music blasting from a low quality loud speaker.
Rode the bikes past the harbor, back to Toölo, stopped at the Regatta cafe for coffee and blueberry cake (this cafe gives you 5 cents BACK every time you get a refill -- interesting idea).
Back to the apartment to relax for a bit (for some reason was pretty tired), and went out again for dinner, this time fairly late (can´t remember the name of the place) and then for drinks again at the rooftop bar. I was surprised at how much darker midnight was than how it looked my first night in Helsinki from the same location.
Frank Black -- So. Bay
No comments:
Post a Comment